Here is another thing to ponder. Ladies, if you lived in a gigantic housing facility where people could see you bathing from a balcony, wouldn't you be more careful? What if you knew that a super famous and good-looking rich man lived in the perfect location to watch you bathe? You will never convince me that Bath-sheba didn't know exactly what she was doing. Especially because she was ovulating at the time, otherwise she would not have become pregnant. So Bath-sheba was ho'nee and David was an innocent victim in all of this. THAT is why he was shown mercy...
Glaring omission in yesterdays Watchtower Study
by Bloody Hotdogs! 46 Replies latest watchtower bible
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EdenOne
Since the WT was on David's case, I wonder why they didn't mention another glaring sin of the King: The census of the tribes of Israel. According to 2 Chronicles 21:1-15, Satan incited David to make a census of the nation. Since the Law didn't forbade to number the Israelites, God knows why it was considered a serious sin. But Joab saw the wrongness of the census beforehand and David felt guilty afterwords.
As a result of this sin, Jehovah said he would bring about punishment and told David to choose what kind of punishment. David said: Let us fall, please, into the hand of Jehovah, for many are his mercies" (2 Samuel 24:14) In his mercy, Jehovah spared David and instead caused a pestilence that killed 70.000 (!!) israelites.
Two questions surface:
a) Why were the Israelites punished for the sin of David? What was their guilt?
b) Was the sin of David so serious that it warranted the death of 70.000 people??
This account has always troubled me.
Eden
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DATA-DOG
Why didn't Joab refuse to arrange Uriah's death?! Perhaps he implicitly trusted the earthly organization's human leader, King David? See what happens when you want a human King? Lurking Elders: Would you have disobeyed King David's order?!
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blondie
This is how the WTS explains it in a Question From Readers
*** w69 3/15 p. 191 Questions From Readers ***
As a punishment for this sin Jehovah brought three days of pestilence that killed 70,000 Israelites. (2 Sam. 24:12-16) Was that unjust? Were 70,000 innocent people dying for the king’s error? The Bible plainly shows that we all are sinners deserving of death; it is only by God’s undeserved kindness that we live. (Rom. 3:23; 6:23; Lam. 3:22, 23) So those who died had no special “right” to life. Additionally, can any human today say for sure that those 70,000 were not guilty of some serious sin not mentioned in the historical record?
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Gopher
Ezekiel 18:20 says "The soul who sins is the one who will die. The son will not share the guilt of the father, nor will the father share the guilt of the son." Unless of course, you want to let the father get off.
Note also how David quickly stopped mourning after the child finally died, like it hardly mattered any more. As a man of war, David had seen a lot of death. So what's one more, to him? A small sacrifice for the good of the kingship.
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james_woods
The Bible plainly shows that we all are sinners deserving of death; it is only by God’s undeserved kindness that we live. (Rom. 3:23; 6:23; Lam. 3:22, 23) So those who died had no special “right” to life. Additionally, can any human today say for sure that those 70,000 were not guilty of some serious sin not mentioned in the historical record?
Exactly right, Blondie - those 70,000 NEEDED killing for other reasons, aside from the census. Had no right to life, either.
That Bathsheeba baby was also probably the spawn of Satan and would have grown up to be a serial killer.
Now everybody stop thinking, do what the Watchtower says, and shut up.
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EdenOne
Hello Blondie.
Yep, that same explanation was surely repeated in the WT literature more recently than 1969, becuase I remeber reading about that same explanation in some literature from my time. I was born post-1969. Well, the explanation that we're all sinners, therefore, we all deserve to die, anyway, wipes out any trace of mercy from Jehovah. People die from Adamic death because of their sins, that's it. Why were those 70.000 more deserving of an early death than everyone else? As for the insinuation that they must have been guilty of some sin that was kept in secret, that soooo reminds me of the low blow insinuation that Job's false friends made about him: You are surely being punished for some hideous hidden sin. What an awfull person you are, you wicked sinner!
Eden
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Gopher
When Israel's neighbor nations sacrificed their children in the fires to their false god, it obviously was a sign of demonism and sickness. But when a king's actions sacrifice 70,000 people to the angry "true" God, it's obviously a sign of God's righteousness.
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steve2
One of the embarrassing difficulties for religious groups who draw upon the Hebrew Scriptures (AKA The Old Testament) is it is brim full of murderous rage and violence that, by today's standards is monstrous and outrageous. Hence, when using "stories" from those scriptures, you have to sanitize them and leave out so much that has modern, rights-oriented thinkers reasonably wondering what "sort" of "god" is the god of the Jews?
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PaintedToeNail
So, sidetracking a little from the original thread, to DATA-DOG's comment about the Messiah, why couldn't the Messiah have come from another of David's sons? Why did the linet have to be from Bathsheba through Solomon? Why not from Abigail or one of his other numerous wives?